Minister for Minor Irrigation N.S. Boseraju held a meeting of Minor Irrigation Department officials of Mysuru division in the city on Monday, June 26, and took stock of the ongoing works by the department.
He called upon the officials to ensure that the works taken up by the department are not only completed on time, but also maintain quality. He also warned that people in charge of the works will be held accountable for lapses.
Arguing that progress of work shown on paper was not acceptable, Mr. Boseraju said the engineers of the department should regularly make visits to the spot of works to monitor the progress.
He emphasised the need for speedy completion of work on repair of lakes in view of the onset of monsoon. Any breach in the works will create a lot of problems to the farmers, he said while calling upon the officials to ensure that the water requirements of the farmers are adequately met through lakes and lift irrigation projects.
A total of 12,500 works of the department were in progress in different parts of Karnataka while bills worth ₹1,500 crore were pending.
While new works should be taken up in the department, he instructed the officials to clear the pending bills in the order of seniority without giving room for confusion.
The meeting was attended by Chief Engineer of the department Raghavan and Superintending Engineer Kishore, besides the Executive Engineers of Mangaluru, Hassan, Mysuru, Chikkmagaluru, Chamarajanagar, Kodagu and Mandya districts.
Guarantee schemes
Speaking to reporters in Mysuru, Mr. Boseraju said former Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa should urge the Centre to provide rice to the people of Karnataka instead of threatening to hold a protest against the State government on the implementation of the guarantees.
“Instead of holding a protest, he should bring pressure on the Centre to release rice for distribution among the poor people of Karnataka,” Mr. Boseraju said.
The earlier Congress government, under Mr. Siddaramaiah, was providing 7 kg of rice to each member of the Below Poverty Line (BPL) family. The BJP government had brought it down to 5 kg per head, but the Congress has promised to provide 10 kg of rice per head now, he said while calling upon the BJP to co-operate with the Congress Government in the State.
Out of the five guarantees promised by the Congress government in the State, Mr. Boseraju said free KSRTC transport scheme for women — Shakti — has already been launched while efforts were underway for launch of Gruha Jyothi and Gruha Lakshmi.
Though the BJP was trying to create hurdles in the implementation of the Anna Bhagya scheme, the State government will fulfill the promise given to the people, he said.
